You’d think I’d be entering a card in every one of Seize the Birthday’s challenges, and I should since in addition to The Topper, you can submit any birthday card. It’s getting it on the list that seems to be the problem. This time I’m submitting a birthday card that was specifically created for The Topper: Winged Things.

I keep a box of purchased, but unused, products, and one of them was the Jumbo Curiosity Dragonfly by The Greetery. I knew at once that this was my opportunity, and I’m quite sure I won’t have any difficulty finding a recipient for the card.

Luckily I found some alcohol ink panels I created a long time ago and thought that this pink, blue, and aqua one would be perfect for the dragonfly. You can barely see the background on the focal point panel in the above photo, but it’s more clearer at the bottom of the panel in the next photo. I initially tried embossing it in clear, but it wasn’t very nice, so instead I stamped the Simon Says  Bold Leaves background stamp in black on black. I wasn’t sure that would work, but it’s lovely IRL.

I added some foam behind the dragonfly panel and behind its wings for some dimension. The sentiment and the die cut banner are from The Greetery as well. The final touch was to add some gems which luckily matched the dragonfly’s wings perfectly.

I’ll also be adding this at NBUS since this is the dragonfly’s inaugural appearance!

We’ve had one day of sunshine in the last week, but the forecast for now shows no more sun until February 1st. I certainly hope the meteorologists are wrong!

Edited:  I received a lovely invitation in the comments to submit this card to another challenge: Color Options where the prompt is BLACK! It’s a new challenge for me, but I’m happy to oblige. They have a fabulous mood board:

Obviously, I’m a little late to the party, but fortunately Amy has left the link open until Monday. I missed adding the date to my calendar, but really want to participate each month so I can put some of my favorite wooden stamps to use again. This month Amy has collaborated with Ann of Impress Stamps. Many, many years ago on my first trip to Seattle, I happened upon Impress Stamps in a high end mall near our hotel. I made several visits there in the four days we were in Seattle, just overwhelmed with the number of stamps and the fabulous samples displayed in the store.

My last trip to Impress was in September of 2019 when we were in Washington and Oregon for my nephew’s wedding. We flew in and out of Seattle, and the very first stop, after picking up our rental car, was Impress Stamps. By that time, the store in the mall had closed, but the same wonderful vibe existed in the new-to-me store. Over the intervening years, I’ve ordered from their online store, and am always impressed (yes, I did that on purpose) with the quality of their products and their customer service. All of the stores have now closed, but fortunately, the online store is still in business.

This month’s card uses a larger wooden stamp from Rubbermoon as well as my all-time favorite sentiment sets from Impress. I have five different inside sentiments to finish the “wishing you . . .” 

Although I didn’t photograph it, the inside reads “a birthday full of delightful surprises.” After stamping the image on a piece of light gray cardstock, I pulled out my Polychromo pencils to color it. (I certainly didn’t have any Copic markers in the early days!) I filled in the stars with a Signo silver pen and added a dot of Gelly Roll Clear Star to the center of each star.

I used one of the Ellen Hutson Essential Rectangles to die cut the main image and then used the same die again on silver mirror cardstock to create the frame around it. I think this is a pretty gender neutral card and I’m happy to have it in my stash.

I’m delighted to be the Guest Designer for the new Color Throwdown Challenge. I was the lucky winner there earlier in December, and was invited to create a card for the current Color Throwdown Challenge. 

I love this color combination and had several Ideas for creating my card. In the end, I went my usual Clean and Simple route, and am pleased with the results. I think this design has potential for many different occasions.

Choosing the Etched Berry Branch by Simon Says was the starting point. After die cutting the branch in a very light gray, I die cut it again using a magenta cardstock and used just the berries which I fussy cut and added to the gray branch. 

The branch was added to a light gray layer die cut with Hero Arts Infinity Rounded Rectangles and then to a slightly larger black panel. They were then added to the white card base. The sentiment, from Ellen Hutson Cake, was stamped in black, and as a final touch I added some Nuvo Crystal Glaze to the berries. 

I hope you’ll hop over to the Color Throwdown Challenge, and check out the wonderful inspiration by the Design Team, and then join in the fun!

Three of my granddaughters requested Target gift cards. I made sure to pick our three distinct designs so there’d be no confusion about whose card was whose! It was also helpful when I set about making gift card holders. I used Pinkfresh Studio’s Fillable Gift Card Holder for all three. These easily fit into an A2 envelope.

The oldest is eleven now, and I chose the snowflake design for her. The My Favorite Things Snowflake Window die was just perfect. It’s impossible to photograph, but the snowflake was heavily misted with Glimmer spray and is lovely in person.

The middle granddaughter is eight, and pretty savvy, so I’m not sure if she believes in Santa or not. I decided she wasn’t too old for snowmen, and all her gifts are wrapped in a cute snowman pattern. I stamped, colored, and die cut designs from My Favorite Things Present Time and MFT’s Jingle All the Way to decorate her card. The snowflakes are from Papertrey Ink’s Winter Hills set.

The youngest is six, and I’m pretty sure the older two have not ruined any ideas about Santa for her. The images on her card are also from MFT’s Jingle All the Way and Papertrey’s Winter Hills.

I’m sending these over to Just Add Ink Challenge where they’re looking for anything except a card, to Christmas Kickstart where you can link up anything Christmasy, and to the Four Seasons Challenge: Anything Goes Winter.

The Paper Players theme for the current challenge is: Santa. 

I have some Santa tags to share. I purchased some snow globe/music boxes for my grandchildren and found the cutest boxes to package them. I photographed only three of the five. 

I’d been waiting for an opportunity to use the Ornament Options stamp set and die by Simon Says, and it was just perfect for these boxes. These are the first tags I’ve made this season, but I have a lot more to create, and there are multiple options for the words around the circle. I opted to use my favorite Santa image from My Favorite Things Jingle All the Way to embellish them. I stamped them, colored them with Copics, and then die cut them before adding them to the tags with some dimensional tape.

All I had to do was tie them onto the box with some red and white twine. Probably the easiest wrapping I’ll do this year!